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[Seprix]

I'm not going to type a funny intro this time, because nobody likes my jokes. As such, people may make their own jokes instead, like a Smithy would make something. And I will draw inspiration, also from Smithy in the Dominion sense.

I can see why nobody likes my jokes.

-Is Smithy still okay nowadays, because it looks so bland and it doesn't have text coming out of its nose?
-How bad is the art?
-Adventures combos?

[Haddock]

1) Smithy's still fine.  The number of times recently I've played kingdoms that look wonderfully enginey at first glance and then you realise there's no terminal draw, and that Smithy would feel reeeeaaaalllll nice just about then.
2) Bad
3) Well, Lost arts for a start...

[Infthitbox]

True story: there was period of time where I called Smithy the worst card in Dominion because you played it and couldn't do anything else on your turn. Despite the fact that I was well aware of what Village was, the fact that this wasn't a "lab" just made it awful in my opinion.

[ced]

Smithy's main niche is increasing your handsize by 2 while costing less than 5. You can count on one hand the number of cards that do that*. Hence it combines well with stop card villages while being gainable with Ironworks & friends.

One interesting question is how it compares to the weaker draw 3s for 5 - Rabble, Journeyman, Catacombs. How much extra value are you getting for the 4->5 jump in cost for each of these cards and is that jump in cost significant when you want to buy the terminal draw?


*Menagerie, Envoy, Ranger - not counting Beggar/Scout

[Roadrunner7671]

Smithy's main niche is increasing your handsize by 2 while costing less than 5. You can count on one hand the number of cards that do that*. Hence it combines well with stop card villages while being gainable with Ironworks & friends.

One interesting question is how it compares to the weaker draw 3s for 5 - Rabble, Journeyman, Catacombs. How much extra value are you getting for the 4->5 jump in cost for each of these cards and is that jump in cost significant when you want to buy the terminal draw?


*Menagerie, Envoy, Ranger - not counting Beggar/Scout

Edge cases: Cost reducers!

But not counting Scout isn't fair 

[Seprix]

Should I even add flavor text before the questions? Nobody noticed when I omitted it entirely from Remodel.

[Roadrunner7671]

Should I even add flavor text before the questions? Nobody noticed when I omitted it entirely from Remodel.

I did but I didn't say anything. I like your jokes.

[Seprix]

Smithy's main niche is increasing your handsize by 2 while costing less than 5. You can count on one hand the number of cards that do that*. Hence it combines well with stop card villages while being gainable with Ironworks & friends.

One interesting question is how it compares to the weaker draw 3s for 5 - Rabble, Journeyman, Catacombs. How much extra value are you getting for the 4->5 jump in cost for each of these cards and is that jump in cost significant when you want to buy the terminal draw?


*Menagerie, Envoy, Ranger - not counting Beggar/Scout

Yeah, +3 Card Draw is still pretty strong, especially for that cheap.

[Squidd]

My all-time favorite "noob Dominion mistake" story is still the guy on BGG who thought Smithy was broken because he thought "+Card" meant "gain literally any card."

[jsh357]

Smithy lets you draw three cards

[McGarnacle]

The nice thing about smithy is that you pay for + 3 cards. That's all you get. But it only costs $4. Often that's all you want, and being able to pick up your village or trasher and a + cards on a 4/3 split is nice. Other similar cards give you nice added effects, like Journeyman, Margrave, etc. But they cost more, and sometimes you just want the + cards.

[jomini]

Smithy's main niche is increasing your handsize by 2 while costing less than 5. You can count on one hand the number of cards that do that*. Hence it combines well with stop card villages while being gainable with Ironworks & friends.

One interesting question is how it compares to the weaker draw 3s for 5 - Rabble, Journeyman, Catacombs. How much extra value are you getting for the 4->5 jump in cost for each of these cards and is that jump in cost significant when you want to buy the terminal draw?


*Menagerie, Envoy, Ranger - not counting Beggar/Scout

There are more cards than that:
Watchtower, Jack, Hermit/Madman, and Gear (next turn) can all manage this. Then there are many, many combos that work for this with all components under $4: Procession/Fort, Tr/anything with +2 cards, etc.

That said, what Smithy really gives you is a hassle free way to increase hand size. No need to fish for $5, you can just hit $4 and go. No need to thin out all the starting dross & use action cash. No need to wait a turn and often send back dross. No need to wait a shuffle and skip a buy. No need to deal with a silver flood. Smithy is easily the most versatile cheap draw card in the game. Any sort of village setup works with Smithy. You can draw stuff dead or miss villages to kick off chain ... and that is pretty much it.

[timchen]

Smithy's main niche is increasing your handsize by 2 while costing less than 5. You can count on one hand the number of cards that do that*. Hence it combines well with stop card villages while being gainable with Ironworks & friends.

One interesting question is how it compares to the weaker draw 3s for 5 - Rabble, Journeyman, Catacombs. How much extra value are you getting for the 4->5 jump in cost for each of these cards and is that jump in cost significant when you want to buy the terminal draw?


*Menagerie, Envoy, Ranger - not counting Beggar/Scout

This question is usually irrelevant, in the vacuum without other kingdom cards.

If there are no better 5s in the kingdom and I know I am likely going to draw 5 and I know I only want one terminal draw, then yes I might buy silver instead of smithy when I have 4 in hand. The same thing, when we have a better $5 we want to mass then I'll prefer to spend 4 on smithies.

So it is not so much how these draw 3 cards card compare to one another. It is how do they compare to other cards at 4 and 5 costs.

[Davio]

Smithy lets you draw three cards

Yeah, that's about it.
What more can you say?

Most people understand having more cards in hand lets you do more stuff.

[Seprix]

Smithy lets you draw three cards

Yeah, that's about it.
What more can you say?

Most people understand having more cards in hand lets you do more stuff.

Well, there are a couple of technical things you could discuss, like how much +3 draw is worth, or something like that. Honestly, though... I regret starting this entire Base Set 'Let's Discuss' thing in the first place. I knew most of these cards would be duds, and that people would get sick of them, and then somebody started with Adventurer (which is probably one of the most interesting cards in the Base set for not really being thought of), and well, I felt like I had to finish it.

I don't have a ton of desire to write more of these. I'd love to do Dark Ages, but that's because all the cards are fascinating and it's my favorite set. I don't really want to do any other set. Nobody really cares about these anyways. It was fun for Adventures, since nobody knew anything about Adventures. But everyone knows about Smithy. How many people is it really helping?

As many people seemingly disagreed with Awaclus about how useful these threads were when this Base thing first started, it seems that he is right after all, and that all of this is very possibly pointless. Maybe it's just the Base Set being droll, but I'm not so sure about that anymore.

[Davio]

You can just cherrypick interesting cards and skip the dull ones.

[Awaclus]

Why not cherry pick the cards that you actually have something worthwhile to say about?

[Chris is me]

Really it would have been fine it we did any set other than Base Set, or at least newest sets first. Like, a thread on Butcher or Journeyman is bound to be more interesting than Remodel or Smithy.

This particular card is just too simple to discuss. "Is terminal draw good?" "Yeah usually it is" "ok"

[ThetaSigma12]

Comboes with villa!